A fter our night with Nels, DJ and I headed back to Reel Fun with an extra guest. Not Nels, who shambled back to his boat around midnight, but our cute waitress, Beth. Even I couldn’t deny DJ’s ability to charm.

On the voyage to Long Bay—east on the coast from Krum Bay—I stayed down in the cockpit while he let Beth steer Reel Fun from his lap. Within an hour, DJ motored into the marina where I kept my catamaran, Wayward . I told him he could stay in the slip adjacent to Wayward , since I’d leased it as well.

From there, I took a short walk up the pier, then onto Frenchman Bay Road, where I fell into bed next to my wife, Alicia.

In what felt like an instant, I awoke to sunlight and the sound of laughter from the kitchen. DJ’s and Alicia’s.

And Beth’s.

DJ really brought his one night stand to my house.

Beth seemed like a nice girl, but I didn’t want strangers poking around my place.

I grumbled and checked the time on my phone—9:17 a.m.

Dammit ! The VA had been open for over an hour.

I rolled out of bed and headed into the master bath to wash the bar stink off me.

Fifteen minutes later, I came out of my room, dressed in a pair of dark blue jeans and a gray golf shirt emblazoned with Newport Beach PD Memorial Day Cookout on the pocket. I’d picked it for a reason—if she were up to anything, I wanted her to know she was dealing with a cop.

Past the end of the hall, I saw Beth’s profile. She sat on the nearest bar stool, her back hunched over, her hands in her lap, and wearing a hoodie that had to belong to DJ. “Hey, Dep, is that you I hear lurking in the hallway?” DJ called from the kitchen. “You don’t hafta be shy, my friend. Come on out and say good morning to the ladies!”

Alicia giggled, which got my blood pumping. I didn’t understand why she always laughed at DJ’s inane comments—especially the ones about me.

I came marching out of the mouth of the hall. All three of them were at the breakfast bar, which was a chest-high bar top between the kitchen and living room.

Alicia leaned against the counter on the kitchen side, holding a mug of coffee. She looked as sweet as she ever had in her lavender bath robe, hip cocked to one side, blond hair resting on her near shoulder. She’d say she was messy and unpresentable to company. I’d say she was cute beyond belief.

DJ leaned on his elbows on the far end of the bar, grinning at me. He noticed me checking out my wife. I walked around him, opened the cabinet, and took out a coffee cup.

“Morning, everyone,” I said, as I carried my cup across the kitchen toward Alicia and the coffeemaker.

I planted a kiss on my wife’s forehead.

“DJ said you two closed down the bars last night.” She took a sip of her coffee, trying to hide her grin.

“That’s a technicality,” I said. “More like a person of interest closed down one bar, and we were there with him.”

DJ threw his head back and laughed. Coffee dripped down the side of his mug.

“Man, they musta beaten the fun out of you at the police academy—the man can’t even admit when he had a fun night out.” He turned his attention from Alicia to me. “But I know I saw you smiling once or twice when you were talking to old Nels, buddy. He might look rough, but surely the man knows how to have a good time.”

“Surely he does,” Beth said, her eyes going wide, as if there was more to the story than any of us knew.

“Sounds like somebody else I know.” Alicia’s eyes settled on DJ.

“Ain’t nothing wrong with a man enjoying himself now and again,” he protested. “Took me a long time to figure that out. Believe it or not, I used to be as uptight about everything as my man, Dep—” He stopped himself, averting his eyes from me, and took a sip from his coffee.

His jabs were getting on my nerves, but it was too early in the day to verbally spar with DJ. So, I decided to let it slide. I stayed posted next to Alicia, enjoying a hot cup of black coffee.

She elbowed me, but I didn’t react.

“It’s true,” DJ continued, “I used to be a very regimented person. Up at oh-six-hundred, haircut every weekend, the next day’s clothes laid across my footlocker each night. Every detail accounted for, every decision by the book, every day predictable and planned from the minute I lifted my head from the pillow to when I pulled my blankets over me and turned out the light. I was as flat and crisp as a pair of ironed socks.”

I’m sure I wasn’t the only one who had trouble squaring that version of DJ Martin with the man I saw before me. I looked across the bar at Beth furrowing her brow. It was hard to imagine him being one of the guys at the very pointy tip of the spear of American military muscle.

“That must’ve been quite an eyeful,” Beth said. She pinched a lock of his hair, pulling it away from his face. “I could almost picture a respectable young man under all this mess. And under that man, a wild party boy who loved to play with girls’ hearts.”

“Truth be told, I kept myself in lockstep. If I didn’t, I’d have had some butter-bar second lieutenant chomping my ear off about why I was three minutes late to morning PT for all that mattered.” He shrugged. “The Taliban might’ve blown my leg off, but they knocked the stick out of my ass too.”

I didn’t quite know what to make of that, and from the perplexed looks of the two women, they didn’t either. Was it a joke? Did he want our sympathy? It was difficult to comprehend how a man losing his leg could think of that as a good thing.

My eyes wandered up to the clock above the bar. It was 9:38.

I gulped down a mouthful of hot coffee. “The VA opened at eight this morning.” The coffee burned my throat, but I didn’t care. “We need to double-time it over to Charlotte Amalie.”

“You need a ride home?” DJ asked Beth, making eyes with her. “Ain’t got a car to take you anywhere, but Reel Fun can get you to any side of the island without a problem.”

She smiled at him. “You’re sweet, DJ, but I can get a ride all on my own. I don’t need you to trouble yourself if you’ve got a job to do. I’ll call my sister to come get me.”

He smiled back at her. “You’re just a peach, ain’t ya? But you don’t need to bother her. I’ll get you home.”

“DJ,” I said, “we really need to get out to the VA.”

If that Marc guy was hanging around like Nels said, we needed to talk to him as soon as possible. Leads didn’t stay warm for long, and he could have already been there and left. We knew nothing about what treatment he got there or how often.

“I appreciate you,” Beth said to DJ. “But you have work to do, and you better get to it. Don’t keep things held up for me. I’ll call my sister, then walk down to the marina and wait for her.”

One problem taken care of, I thought. At least I wouldn’t have to leave Alicia here alone with Beth.

“You don’t have to do that,” Alicia said. “We’ve got plenty of coffee to drink—I’d never finish this whole pot on my own.” She waved a hand at the coffee maker, which was only a quarter full. I’d seen her drink more than that in a single morning. “We can sit out on the porch while your sister is on her way over.”

“I wouldn’t want to keep you from your morning.”

“You’re not,” Alicia answered. “I’m always up for good company.” She grinned at DJ. “You couldn’t possibly be as boring as this one-legged pirate.”

“Yaarrgghh!” DJ said. “I resemble that remark.”

If anything, I wished Alicia were right and DJ would take it a little slower.

“We both know you’ll start crying about how much you miss me as soon as I step out that door,” DJ said, pointing toward the sliding glass door overlooking the Caribbean. “I know living with Jerry would have me pulling my hair out every minute of the day.”

I put my coffee mug in the sink and left the kitchen.

“Jerry—” Alicia started to say, but I didn’t stop. I walked toward the deck door, got my shoes on, then laced them up while I sat on the couch with my back to the others.

“Don’t worry about him,” DJ said. “He’s sweating out all the beer from last night. A little sunshine, a little ocean, and a whole lot of chasing down a murderer is gonna get his spirits right back where they should be.”

I rose from the couch and turned toward DJ. He gave me a look that told me he knew he’d crossed the line, but he didn’t care.

“Let’s get going,” I said, heading over to give Alicia a quick kiss.

Then I turned and walked out the back door. By the time I was down the wooden steps leading from the porch, DJ was thumping down from the top.

“Don’t worry about us; we’ve got this job locked down real tight. Everybody’s cool, everything’s gonna be smooth sailing,” he called back to Alicia and Beth. “We’ll be back in time for dinner.”